A 263rd GARLAND OF BRITISH LIGHT MUSIC COMPOSERS
In a real sense this Garland stems entirely from just
one song of 1915, The Song of Songs (subtitled Chanson d’un
Coeur Brisé, or "Song of a Broken Heart")
which I heard very recently in transcription as an encore in a concert
given by the Missenden Piano Trio. Their copy attributed the piece –
dated 1915 and almost too archetypal a Palm Court number – to "Moya".
Further research elicited that this was a pseudonym for the pianist
and conductor Harold Vicars, whose only composition of note this
appears to be, although he contributed numbers to a musical comedy Where’s
Uncle in 1904.
The Song of Songs was, apparently, originally
indeed a song. Consequently the version I heard was itself an arrangement,
credited on the copy to "Langey". It, or its accompaniment,
also had sundry arrangements by Howard Carr, H.M. Higgs, Eddie Griffiths,
Gilbert Stacey and Reginald Tilsley. These arrangers are worth a few
words in their own right(s), though Carr and Higgs have received the
Garland treatment previously.
Otto Langley (1851-1922) was German–born but
he spent much of his life in this country. He was a prolific producer,
of arrangements (titled, for example, Brahmsiana, The Emerald
Isle, From the Highlands and Sounds for England), instructional
material and many lightish orchestral compositions of which we can instance
the ballet caprice, Dance of the Debutantes, Evening Breeze,
for strings, the overtures Liberty and Uncle Tom, the
"ländler", Two Little Comrades, with parts for
two solo violins, the "coaching carol" Merry Postillion,
the barcarolle Gondolier and Nightingale (represented a solo
flute), Three Oriental Sketches, Two Scottish Dances and a Serenata
Neapolitana.
Eddie Griffiths was in demand post-1945 as an
arranger, producing, among other things, medleys for "Friday Night
is Music Night". Gilbert Stacey, whose career spanned both
World Wars, also made many arrangements and published a miniature for
strings Bellissima; mostly, though, he composed lightish songs
with titles When Evening Shadows Fall (1918), Up the Gunners,
Down in the Gardens at Kew and Though It’s Only a Dream.
Reginald Tilsley flourished in the 1950s and 1960s as an arranger
of, for example, orchestral medleys like Welsh Fantasy and, from
Scotland, Into the High Hills and orchestrations of individual
traditional items. He composed, too, his orchestral inspirations including
the Overture to a Horse Opera, Little Donkey, Marine Parade, Paris
Soir and, dated 1961, Leicester Square Lament. The Tortoise and
the Hare was described as a "fable" for orchestra with
narrator.
Philip L Scowcroft
April 2002
Philip's book 'British Light Music Composers' (ISBN 0903413 88 4) is
currently out of print.
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